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Vaccination Challenge
This letter by Dr Viera Scheibner, Principle Research Scientist (Rtd)
and now prominent public campaigner, was sent to and published in the
Medical Observer, an Australian medical newspaper, in February 1999.

Medical Observer Pty Ltd
Level 2, 100 Bay Road,
Waverton NSW 2060

19 February 1999

Dear Editor,

SIMON CHAPMAN TO TAKE HIS OWN MEDICINE

On February 19, 1999, the Medical Observer published an article by
Simon Chapman, in which he issued a challenge to the anti-vaccination
movement in Australia.

My response to his provocative article is as follows:

If vaccines are such a blessing I challenge Simon Chapman to appear on
television and allow himself to be injected with all baby vaccines, adjusted
to his body weight by a doctor of my choice and in my presence.

There isn't a better way to demonstrate to us that vaccines are safe
and effective than by Simon taking his own medicine.

After every lot of vaccines an independent medical doctor and myself
would
assess Simon's reactions and the general state of health. Long-term
reactions will be followed up for 3 years.

If you do not publish my letter and/or Simon does not agree to this
easy and safe demonstration, then it will show us all that vaccinators are
dishonest and are afraid of their own medicine. In other words: put up or
shut up.

I will publicise this proposition and your response on the Internet to
ensure that my response to Simon's challenge is widely known.

Yours very sincerely,
Viera Scheibner Ph.D

Simon Chapman has been pretty quiet since this challenge and still is
as of today.

We issue the same challenge to all others in trusted positions of
"authority" who actively promote the injection of these substances into
humans, or indeed any other living creature.

This letter by Dr Viera Scheibner, Principle Research Scientist (Rtd)
and now prominent public campaigner,

Another example of the logical fallacy of "argument from authority".

"Principal Research Scientist" and "Dr" is one presumes proclaimed to
add weight to her otherwise rather empty arguments. It would
therefore be appropriate to consider them in a bit more detail.

Firstly, she is not a Dr of medicine but a Geologist who gained her
PhD in 1964. Her most notable contribution to science was a paper on
"The Cretaceous and Jurassic Foraminifera of the Carpathian Klippen
Belt in Slovakia" and her specialty in Australia was the Cretaceous
and Permian Foraminifera of the Great Australian Basin in New South
Wales.

Scheibner claim to be a Principle Research Scientist concerns her
training and experience as a Geologist and her appointment at the
Geological Survey of New South Wales. She retired in 1987. She has
never published a scientific paper on the subject of vaccination (or
indeed any medical subject).

Her most recent award was in 1997, when she was awarded the "Bent
Spoon Award". This award is presented annually to the Australian
"perpetrator of the most preposterous piece of pseudoscientific
piffle":

Her most recent award was in 1997, when she was awarded the "Bent
Spoon Award". This award is presented annually to the Australian
"perpetrator of the most preposterous piece of pseudoscientific
piffle":

Her most recent award was in 1997, when she was awarded the "Bent
Spoon Award". This award is presented annually to the Australian
"perpetrator of the most preposterous piece of pseudoscientific
piffle":

I don't think you understand the meaning of the phrase. Scheibner is
using one of her old positions when in employment decades ago and her
PhD inappropriately. Presumably she uses them to lend weight to her
otherwise insubstantial articles. It is the deceitful use of her past
history and irrelevant qualifications which is being commented on.

One assumes she wishes readers to think her experience and
qualifications give her some authority in the field in which she is
writing. They do not.

A Paleontologist is not usually the first stop when looking for
medical advice and an expert on Permian Plankton fossil research is
somewhat different from a medical research scientist. The quality of
her amateur work since her retirement has, as you probably know, been
subject to consistent criticism. Her inability to understand
statistics is widely commented upon and Stephen Basser described her
incompetent work on Japanese rates of SIDS as "At best sloppy, and at
worst blatantly dishonest.Ē

Notably, despite her self professed expertise in the field of
vaccination she has not published a single scientific paper on the
subject.

On Thu, 20 Aug 2009 17:47:09 +0100, Peter Parry wrote:
Her inability to understand
statistics is widely commented upon and Stephen Basser described her
incompetent work on Japanese rates of SIDS as "At best sloppy, and at
worst blatantly dishonest.Ē

Stephen Basser is good.

Stephen Basser in "the Skeptic", Vol 17 No 1, in "Anti-immunisation sca The
inconvenient facts":

What these figures demonstrate is a period of no significant
change in cases or deaths (1960-64) followed by a period of
marked decline (1965-69). Anyone with even a rudimentary
knowledge of epidemiology would look at these figures and
hypothesize that something occurred around about 1963-64
that resulted in a marked decline in the number of cases
and deaths from measles.

What happened at this time? Measles immunisation was
introduced in the USA in 1963-64.

Dr Scheibner, not surprisingly, does not report these
figures, but she does claim that:
...vaccination against measles is totally ineffective
and

If measles immunisation is "totally ineffective" then I
would be interested in her explanation for the above figures,
and for the experience in Finland, where a nationwide
immunisation program resulted in a 99% decrease in the
incidence of measles.52
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
/quote

The column "ratio" I added. It is very interesting to see that change in values.

On Thu, 20 Aug 2009 21:46:55 +0100, "john" wrote:
strange that you should be defending vaccination as you don't seem to be in
the medical industry

What is strange about promoting rational thinking against bigotry,
ignorance and witchcraft?

Vaccination needs no defending. Anyone with intelligence and an open
mind can examine the objective evidence and see that. Do you expect
me to promote the opposite? Do you expect me to espouse a closed
mind, a promotion of ignorance, a cult of celebrity where who says
what is more important than the truth of what they say? A willful
dismissal of anything which doesn't suit pre-conceived prejudices and
conspiracy theories?

Happy Oyster wrote:
On Thu, 20 Aug 2009 17:47:09 +0100, Peter Parry wrote:
Her inability to understand
statistics is widely commented upon and Stephen Basser described her
incompetent work on Japanese rates of SIDS as "At best sloppy, and at
worst blatantly dishonest.Ē

Stephen Basser is good.

Stephen Basser in "the Skeptic", Vol 17 No 1, in "Anti-immunisation sca The
inconvenient facts":